Open API from MasterCard for third-party developers? Priceless

In a press release distributed this morning, the international payment system MasterCard announced that desktop and mobile application developers will receive full access to the API from the payment giant a little later this year.

The company hopes that by opening its technologies to developers, it will have at its disposal new and innovative e-commerce applications that use the MasterCard network, which will potentially allow it to compete with Visa , PayPal and Square (which are currently much more successful in these endeavors - comment translation. ).

Josh Peirez, head of MasterCard's innovation department, says the company is “pleased to help software developers around the world create a new generation of payment applications that will seriously change the game rules of the entire electronic payments industry.” The developers will be helped by the recently launched portal - MasterCard Labs, where they can get access to the API, SDK, manuals and forums for discussing and experimenting with the company's technologies.

The announcement came at a time when the mobile payment market has become a very “hot” place due to the rivalry between start-ups and the giants of payment systems. The San Francisco-based startup Square has a large base of users using their mobile application and hardware key, which allow them to conduct credit card transactions using various mobile devices; PayPal, an online payments mogul, recently teamed up with Bump Technologies to provide service and pay for mobile devices.
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Visa also announced its foray into the mobile payment market. Earlier this month, MasterCard’s main competitor, together with DeviceFidelity, announced the development of a special application for the iPhone, which will allow users to get all the benefits of wireless and contactless payment methods, similar to Visa payWave, directly from their mobile device.

But mobile payments are just one of the platforms MasterCard places its hopes on in creating apps by developers using their API. The company claims that it has identified 20 other areas in which the API it represents can be used, including payroll systems, social networks, e-wallets, and online games.

With the growing popularity of sites such as Blippy , which allows users to automatically exchange with their friends purchases made with a credit card, MasterCard can provide a very valuable API for developers at the right time for these types of platforms and services.

Many doubted these new services because of the obvious security risks that mobile payment systems are fraught with, but MasterCard takes precautions to make sure that their platform is not abused. According to this morning's press release, "all developers will be approved and registered by MasterCard to ensure that the payment and data transfer services from MasterCard are still properly and efficiently used."

_{The translation, as far as possible, was made as close as possible to the original text, but in some places it was necessary to somewhat change the structure of sentences. If there are comments, write a letter with habrapost.}